Release International's Voice Podcast

Bike Pilgrimage

March 03, 2022 Release International Season 3 Episode 3
Release International's Voice Podcast
Bike Pilgrimage
Show Notes Transcript

At Release International we are always inspired by the creative thinking and passionate commitment of our supporters. So often people will come forward with great ideas about how to raise awareness, prayer and funds to support our persecuted brothers and sisters. And it is our privilege to be able to support those initiatives wherever we can.

On today’s podcast we speak to Release International supporter Rev Robert de Berry. This summer Robert is leading an exciting project called the Bike Pilgrimage. You can find out all about the project at releaseinternational.org/bikepilgrims

Listen in as we talk about what inspired this idea, exactly what it entails, and importantly, how you too can get involved. 

Bike Pilgrimage 

“So, I want to combine the two things, riding on a bike – which I love – but making this a pilgrimage because integral to the whole thing are the times of prayer that we’ll have and the churches which host us.” 

Laura:  At Release International, we are always inspired by the creative thinking and passionate commitment of our supporters.  So often, people will come forward with great ideas about how to raise awareness, prayer and funds to support our persecuted brothers and sisters.  And it’s our privilege to be able to support those initiatives wherever we can.  On today’s podcast, I’m speaking to Release International supporter Reverend Robert de Berry.  This summer, Robert is leading an exciting project called the Bike Pilgrimage.  You can find out all about this project at releaseinternational.org/bikepilgrims.  Listen in now as we talk about what inspired this idea, exactly what it entails and, importantly, how you too can get involved. 

Welcome, Robert, to the Voice podcast. 

Robert:  Thank you, it’s good to be here. 

Laura:  It’s great to have you with us.  So, Robert, you are a retired Church of England vicar and you’re leading a very ambitious project this summer which will raise awareness, prayer and funds for persecuted Christians.  And we’ll go on to talk about the project in detail in a bit, but first of all can you just tell us a little bit about yourself and how you were first drawn to be concerned for persecuted Christians. 

Robert:  I’ve been a vicar in inner city parishes; my first one in Sheffield and then two in London.  And the joy of that has been the very multi-racial elements in those churches.  So I learnt a lot.  I also have spent quite a lot of time visiting Uganda and other African countries.  I suppose my first real connections with the persecuted church came through working for a time with Barnabas Fund and I remember, particularly, some significant visits to northern Nigeria and other countries in Africa as well as to Syria, but that was in the time before Syria had its awful present crisis which has gone on for so long. 

Laura:  So the project that you are leading is called a Bike Pilgrimage and you’re going to be riding all the way from North Foreland Point Lighthouse in Kent to Land’s End in Cornwall – and then back again, in a big circle.  How many miles is that? 

Robert:  It’s very difficult to say, because we’ll be zig-zagging and looking for the best routes in terms of lack of traffic, but I’m guessing about 900 miles but I’ve got other people working on the routing for us all.  So it’s a pilgrimage because I’ve done lots of sponsored events in my life and I’ve always made a rule to do one every 5 years, so the last one was in 2017.  But for me it’s become very important to call them pilgrimages because so many people are doing sponsored events and the concentration so often is actually on the particular cause or the charity, which is fine, but there is not the prayer, even if the cause being raised for is Christian.  Whereas the people we’re actually raising money for – the thing that they can do and do do which impresses us so much is that they do pray.  So I want to combine the two things: riding on a bike which I love, and so many other Christians seem to love these days, but making this a pilgrimage because integral to the whole thing are the times of prayer that we’ll have and the churches which host us. 

Laura:  How’s that going to look in terms of how people can join in? Can they join in for just a leg of the journey?  Can they just attend the talks at the churches?  How will that look? 

Robert:  We’ve got some cyclists who are riding with us for a day.  Four of us are doing the whole thing – there and back.  Others are coming for up to a week, or for whatever they can manage.  So we’re still open to people coming as sponsored cyclists.  We do hope that people will join us on those local legs.  In terms of the prayer times, both Release International and CSW are going to send speakers and one of the big events within our pilgrimage is a day conference in Truro when Paul Robinson, the CEO of Release International, and Mervyn Thomas from CSW and Baroness Cox are coming to a conference which will be hosted by Bishop Philip Mountstephen and organised by Dr Russell Blacker, who himself is very well informed about all that is happening to persecuted Christians.  That’s on June 6th and we’d love to get people in the west country joining with us on that Monday.  We’ll also have DVDs and videos, and information.  Each meeting will basically be a time of worship, of information and of times of prayer in groups. 

Laura:  That’s great. I think you’ve painted a really great picture there.  I hope a lot of our listeners really want to get involved, however that may look for them, whether it’s joining a leg of the trip or if it’s doing the whole thing or if it’s just coming along to hear about those stories from persecuted Christians. I think it’s going to be a really valuable time.  You mentioned there about something that you did in 2017, (5 years ago now!). You did something equally if not more adventurous.  Could you tell us a little bit about that? 

Robert:  Well, maybe it was more adventurous, but it certainly was not quite the same level of hard work that is entailed in getting this one going.  It was from Cape Wrath in the northwest of Scotland and instead of doing the normal John O’Groats to Lands End, I wanted to do the other diagonal which is basically Cape Wrath and in our case it was down to Sussex.  So, we went through the Hope Valley in Derbyshire and we ended up at a place called Peacehaven.  So we had a strapline:  Wrath, Hope, Peace.  I haven’t really got a strapline for the present venture, except that somebody has suggested that we should just use the phrase Moses used in speaking to Pharoah: “Let my people go”. 

Laura:  And is there one particular story of persecution or a particular area of the world right now that really stirs you and that is motivating you to do this? 

Robert:  Well, I think, when I left university, I did a gap year on a farming project in Nigeria so I’ve always had an interest in Nigerians and have always had many Nigerians in the churches that I’ve been ministering to.  And when I visited Nigeria in 2011, to see churches that had been destroyed by local militants – Boko Haram and others – it was a dreadfully impressive occasion.  Impressive because the Christians were deeply committed to Christ and deeply prayerful.  I remember visiting an old doctor and he had bought a house some years earlier which, at the time of purchase, was in a very rural area.  But Kano, like cities everywhere, had expanded, and so he was now surrounded mainly by a Muslim population.  And although he was ministering to these people and providing medicines, his house was viciously attacked – the whole building.  Yet here was this lovely – by that time old – man praying for those who had raided and destroyed his house and had so frightened and scared his family. 

Laura:  Goodness, yes, it’s really humbling to hear that, and I think, tragically, we’re still hearing these kinds of stories coming out of places in the world like northern Nigeria.  And I think it’s really coming through there, how visiting these places has really impressed on you a passion for the persecuted church.  And you’re still doing stuff to help them today, which is amazing.  So, something like this, you mentioned earlier, takes a huge amount of work to organise, and a huge amount of enthusiasm to get people motivated to join in.  So how have you found that process so far, and what progress have you been making? 

Robert:  Well, I have to say, because I think in this project there will be a lot of fun, as well as of course intentions about the seriousness of our purpose. But it’s been a great joy to visit the churches – there are about 45 churches that are going to host us – that is, myself and the other cyclists with me.  And what is also exciting is to see how the Spirit of God is leading many churches at this moment.  So whether it’s food banks, whether it’s evangelism, whether it's outreach, whether it’s concern for missions, local and overseas, I’ve been very encouraged by the churches I’ve visited. And also, by the welcome they’re going to extend to our cyclists and the backup car drivers. 

Laura:  All very important aspects. And, having done something like this before Robert, you’ll be well aware that there are often some obstacles that can get in the way of this kind of venture. So, what do you think the biggest challenge will be as you look forward to the summer and how can we pray for you in that? 

Robert: Well, nothing could be worse than the time that we had last time in 2017 when we rode across the Pennines from Manchester to Sheffield. It was the worst day of my cycling life! I have to admit that this time my family, having some doubt as to whether I would complete the present project, have bought me an e-bike.  So I’d better not say that too loudly to the other cyclists, but in my case, I’ve got an e-bike! But the hills in Devon and Cornwall, they don’t go as high as anything in Scotland but they are very challenging and they are very long, and quite tedious really to get up. So there’ll be lots of challenges: weather, I hope we don’t face any challenges of danger, that of course is always something to pray about because, well, a group of cyclists are very vulnerable on the road. But it’s going to be a great time! There may be some last-minute blips, people saying they can’t host us, but I’m praying that won’t happen. 

Laura:  We will definitely be praying for all those practicalities, but also just that it will be a really blessed time as you visit all those churches. So thank you so much Robert for talking to us today.  I know that the rest of our team at Release International is really enjoying working with you on this project. I have two more questions before we finish: So at the end of this project, what is it you want to have achieved? And most importantly, how can our listeners get involved? 

Robert:  Well, this project is being done not only for Release International but also for CSW; and I regard the two – these two Christian charities – as complementary. CSW is concentrating particularly on alerting politicians, and those in power, about what so many Christians are facing. So, their work is very much connected with lobbying at the UN, where they have official status, getting into the European Union, and getting into our own parliament. Their work is very much of research and Release, of course, is into advocacy as well, but in particular is able to get aid out to people. So, for instance, a pastor is in prison. That’s the sort of thing happening in China, North Korea, all sorts of countries, Iran – and Release comes in with support for the family, or it might be support for trauma counselling; it might be direct aid – food – in times of crisis, because these deprivations, so many of our Christian brothers and sisters are suffering from.  So, I’m really hoping that we will be alerting more Christians – and we do need to highlight this and get the profile up – more Christians will be aware of what is happening.  And we’re all so often very parochial – we think of our own concerns, and I find that particularly in the village in which I live:  lovely people, good people, but often very circumscribed by local events and local issues.  And so I’m hoping that we’ll really raise the profile for prayer, for attention politically. We are hoping that we will raise a lot of money for CSW and Release International as well as, of course, the attention and prayer. 

Laura:  Absolutely, we hope so, too, that would be great.  Thank you again so much for speaking to us today. 

Robert:  Thank you. 

Laura:  Robert’s endeavour this summer is so inspiring and we are really thankful to all the cyclists, host churches, the volunteers, and Christian leaders who have caught the vision, and are committed to being involved. Maybe you’re a keen cyclist and could join in some or all of the route. Maybe cycling isn’t your thing, but you are passionate about praying for our persecuted Christian family. If that’s the case, then maybe you could attend one or more of the prayer events along the route. Or maybe you could sponsor Robert, and help him raise the funds to support persecuted believers. Full details of all the events, a map of the route, and information about how you can join as a cyclist or help in other ways are on our website at releaseinternational.org/bikepilgrims.  

Thank you so much for listening to the Voice podcast.  Please do subscribe through your favourite podcast app so you can stay connected to the voice of persecuted Christians. We’d love to hear your feedback too, so please do share your comments with us. You can find us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube. And if you don’t already receive our free quarterly magazine or prayer alert emails, then you can subscribe now on our website at releaseinternational.org/podcast.  

“Remember those who are in prison as if you were in there together with them, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering.  Do not abandon them.”